People Really Are Finding Love On Dating Apps Like Grindr And Tinder

Joel
Simkhai, Grindr CEO.Joel
Simkhai

Apps such as Grindr and Tinder have a seedy reputation - but a
growing number of people are using apps built for one-night
stands to find true love, reports Olivia Goldhill.

Grindr is not the most romantic place to meet your soulmate.
Wildly popular, the dating app for gay men arranges profile
photos in order of proximity and is often used for short term,
sexual relationships arranged at the last minute.

But the app, which has 4.5m users in 192 countries, allows people
to say if they’re interested in a relationship and despite the
unlikely setting, more couples are now finding love. Cohen
Simpson, 23, is about to move in with his boyfriend of two and
half years, who he met through Grindr.

Cohen, who is currently studying for a PhD in new media at LSE,
met his boyfriend while a student at Oxford. Originally from a
rural area where he says homosexuality wasn’t easily accepted,
Cohen argues technology has shaped his love life.

“Having something, a piece of technology that really made that
network explicit, it really took the guess work out of looking
for a potential mate, so that was really powerful.”

Although most people on Grindr are looking for “a more transient
sort of exchange”, Cohen says there are people interested in a
relationship, though it takes perseverance to find them.

He met up with several people for coffee dates before he met his
boyfriend, but aside from a few meetings where the reality didn’t
quite match with a profile photo, Cohen says he enjoyed the dates
he found through Grindr.

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Dr Bernie Hogan, Research Fellow at the Oxford Internet
Institute, says dating apps are particularly well suited for gay
people or other “hidden” communities, such as religious groups,
because the apps make you more findable.

He says: “Now you have to ask yourself—who needs to be found and
how do they want to be found?

“Remember, while there are some flamboyant or camp gay men out
there, there’s a lot of men who are not obviously gay and want a
way to regulate their findability.”

Dr Hogan also says the immediacy of apps can help sustain a
relationship.

“Proximity has always been a very strong determinate of
relationship success.

“Mobile apps, because they can come with you and because they’re
sensitive to location and proximity, really do help to augment
space, make space much more digital.

“So instead of me staying in one place, going on my computer,
checking if I have any messages and co-ordinating far off in the
future, these apps can co-ordinate much more ad-hoc, much more
rapid meetings.”

And despite Mr Hogan’s doubts that a dating app could ever be
successful among a heterosexual population, Tinder is proving him
wrong.

The hot-or-not app, which allows users to decide whether they
want to talk to someone based on one photo, is growing at 5 per
cent a day in the UK and is responsible for more than 50
engagements since its launch in October.

Each profile has just a photo, first name and age, and only users
who approve of each other are able to start a conversation. Like
Grindr, Tinder shows the distance between users but doesn't
reveal the exact location to protect privacy. So far, the app has
served more than 75m matches and 6bn profile ratings.